It’s my birthday again today, just like it was last year, and the year before when I turned Old + 1, so that makes me Old + 3.

- Yesterday, when Rachel came downstairs to my office in the basement to get me for dinner, she said, “Daddy, I have a BWOON (balloon) for you.” “Oh yeah?” I said, “Where is it?” “In my closet! We got it from Target. Mommy said don’t tell you.”

At the dinner table, Adrian also goes, “Daddy, we have BWOON for you. And… COMPWOOTER game!” Elaine is trying hard not to crack up. That’ll teach her to keep secrets from me.

I haven’t gotten the computer game yet, so I can’t tell you which one it is, but I can tell you I’m hoping for Call of Duty 4, and my guess for what Elaine actually got me is Guitar Hero 3 (which would also rock).

- Elaine still managed to surprise me this morning when I came down to my office and it was COMPLETELY CLEAN. There used to be dirty clothes everywhere, wires, books, bags, boxes… all gone. Stored. Sorted. Vaccuumed. I stood at the doorway with my mouth open for a while. This would’ve taken me a WEEK to do. She did it in an hour this morning while I was still sleeping. I don’t know where any of my stuff is anymore, but this is still amazing.

- I got an email from my dad which consists solely of a forward of the automatic reminder that Amazon sent him about my birthday. Subject: “Fwd: Bernie’s Birthday Reminder”, Message: “Hi. You asked to be reminded today of Bernie’s birthday. etc…” That’s it. That’s AWESOME.

Super busy as always, still working on the next chapter of aLp whenever I get a few free minutes at a time, coming at you… “soon”. BLAH BLAH BLAH

^ 49 Comments...

Speaking of Target, I can now get Dunkin’ Donuts coffee…. The Wife doesn’t really "get" Dunkin’ Donuts coffee or what it was to go to Lender’s for Breakfast (For those who didn’t live in CT during the early 80s, the Lender family had a bagel shop of the Post Rd in the Orange/West Haven direction and one in Hamden). mmmMmmm Fresh ‘n’ hot bagels. "Course, they became S. Kinder shops and everything went downhill after the Lenders sold out to Kraft and are now no different than any other bagel in the frozen section… (sigh).

Happy birthday Bernie. Its my birthday end of march, Ill be 25, which is ment to be a big thing, but I just see it as being another year older, another year more bitter & twisted. Dont worry about rushing the next installment of ALP- Im having great fun with this new webiste my older bro told me about a few monyths back…. ‘redtube’ its called; greatwebsite for single guys like me! :P :shock:

bernieh wrote:
- Elaine still managed to surprise me this morning when I came down to my office and it was COMPLETELY CLEAN. There used to be dirty clothes everywhere, wires, books, bags, boxes… all gone. Stored. Sorted. Vaccuumed. I stood at the doorway with my mouth open for a minute. This would’ve taken me a WEEK to do. She did it in an hour this morning while I was still sleeping. I don’t know where any of my stuff is anymore, but this is still amazing.

You are driving me crazy. Listen, I know that posting two times a week was rough. That’s fine, no argument there, you have a life. But it’s been like 3 months of you telling us that a new comic is coming soon, next week, really quick, so on and so forth. So when you made that post saying "yeah, maybe I should quit this" I thought that there was no way that you would continue because clearly you have so little interest in maintaining the site that you can’t put aside the couple hours that it would take to finish a comic over the span of what I believe was two months at the time. So what I’m saying is, if you’re going to quit, quit. If you’re deciding to continue with the comic, put some work in and show the slightest amount of respect for all of the people who continually keep coming back looking for updates. Sorry for sounding like a bag of douche and happy birthday.

Gotta say though, jrock does have a point; it’s extremely frustrating to check for updates after huge amounts of time to find nothing. This is acting more as a blog for you now than a webcomic; perhaps you should consider making a few comics to wrap up storylines and then calling it a day? And Aurelyn, grow up and show respect to other forum users. He’s allowed to express his opinion.

As am I… I merely don’t see why jrock felt he was due some respect from Bernie because he is a reader of his comic. If he wants to treat his site like a blog then he should feel allowed to without being harangued by his non-paying audience. There’s a mailing list set up for the purpose of informing fans when a new episode is out which can spare them the anguish of having to navigate to the site if they feel put upon by doing so.

Aurelyn wrote:
As am I… I merely don’t see why jrock felt he was due some respect from Bernie because he is a reader of his comic. If he wants to treat his site like a blog then he should feel allowed to without being harangued by his non-paying audience. There’s a mailing list set up for the purpose of informing fans when a new episode is out which can spare them the anguish of having to navigate to the site if they feel put upon by doing so.

Kid’s today have a major case of entitlement syndrome. It isn’t really their fault. They are coddled too much, have too many decisions made for them — in their best interests and aren’t permitted to fail due to the impact it will have on their psyche. Likewise, they are rewarded for things as stupid as "graduating" from kindergarden or 2nd grade or having everyone receive a trophy in little league so no one feels left out. These kids grow up thinking they are "owed" something just for their existance, patronage or a click on a mouse. The internet has made things worse because it makes people feel as though they can do exactly what everyone else does — only better. Doing it, isn’t required, just having the gumption to say it is plenty as long as the attitude of "yeah, I can do that" is present.

What’s more, it seems that some hold the opinion that people need to adapt to them. This is probably due to the fact that these people have no independent control in their lives. Rather then simply stop coming to a site, they decide that people need to cater to them because their lives are either (1) so empty that the minute it takes to read a comic is all that is worth living, or (2) they have OCD and can’t stop clicking on the links in their "favorites".

I pity these kids because one day they will really be shocked when something important really affects the bubble that is their existance.

I couldnt agree more with ya dude- alot of people do indeed go around thinking the world owes them something. I think someone once said "ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country"…. same principles apply to life in general me thinks.

Granted, I look forward to the next comic as much (ok, not as much as some people) as the next, but I view each new comic as something nice. I don’t expect to have something that is "free" to have constrants and deadlines. Also, if I don’t find my falling out of my chair laughing, I’m not one to blame the author.

There are always going to be people who feel that other people are obliged to provide them with things when, in effect, they provide nothing in return.

Bernie, I’m looking forward to the next comic whenever you get the chance. Regardless of when it happens, I enjoy your post/blogs and hope they continue too. Next time I’m in NYC, the chinese hot pot is on me (provided you pick a restuarant).

You know what, you must be right! It must be my sense of entitlement that makes me believe that people should take pride in their work. Sure is going to be hard when that bubble pops, let me tell you. Especially with my raging OCD and all. If only I had some sort of independent control in my life…

Bernie does take pride in his work, and you can tell by the quality, regardless whether everyone finds it funny everytime or not. Saddly life gets in the way of our personal desires and hobbies quite often, so items of lesser importance have to be overlooked in favour of say, earning a living…. :roll:

Saddly life gets in the way of our personal desires and hobbies quite often, so items of lesser importance have to be overlooked in favour of say, earning a living….
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Yes, people always bring this up.. my answer is a question:

What has happened in Bernies "earning a living" thats now consuming so much of his time his 2 x weekly updates are now 1 every 3 months?

lol wrote:
Saddly life gets in the way of our personal desires and hobbies quite often, so items of lesser importance have to be overlooked in favour of say, earning a living….
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Yes, people always bring this up.. my answer is a question:

What has happened in Bernies "earning a living" thats now consuming so much of his time his 2 x weekly updates are now 1 every 3 months?

It continually amazes me that people actually take time out of their obviously very full days to post their complaints about the lack of updates. Do you constantly write to your favourite authors about the crippling lack of respect they’re showing you by not writing faster. Did you stand up during Robert Jordan’s funeral, leap on his corpse and pound on his chest.

You bastard, how could you be so inconsiderate to die. Now I’ll never find out what happened!

As always, you miss the point. Its not “work harder” Its “Admit you cant do this alone and get help” There have been guest artists before and im betting some of you would LOVE to draw a strip. Also drop the fan boy routine and read the strips critically.. in the beginning they were damn good, a few even brought tears to my eyes (Preston being fooled into admiting hes an “Internet predator”)

Now you wait a month for ANOTHER dating joke, yeah we get it.. Abe is a bad date, hell Bernie himself admitted he was doing blind-date strips because they were easy.

And please.. “Did you stand up during Robert Jordan’s funeral, leap on his corpse and pound on his chest.
You bastard, how could you be so inconsiderate to die. Now I’ll never find out what happened!”

There’s a TINY difference between someone dying and someone claiming month after month that a new strip is “coming soon” there was even a “there’ll be a renewed focus in the new year” post (remember that? You know, two months ago)

If no new artists (permanent or guest) are brought onboard, one day you will follow your link here and the site will be 404.

If you have lost the interest or don’t have the time sooner or later what your working on will cease. Im VERY sure none of us want that.

Who is this plea supposed to address? The post is short, so re-read it twice before replying.

If I’m understanding you correctly… yeah, I guess I’d be sad if I clicked on the link and got a 404. But, that’s life and I’m thankful for the humor Bernie provided. Look, your attitude is still the same — Bernie doesn’t owe you anything for merely likely his comic. If he stops doing it, so be it. If not, well, maybe more people may see his older comics and derive something from them.

As for the earlier comment about what is going on in Bernie’s life, well that really isn’t your business is it? However, if you want a taste — ask you parents how their retirement portfolios have been doing the last month or two… or move out of mommy and daddy’s, get a job that pays, find a wife, get married, have kids, pay the mortgage, taxes, etc.

lol wrote:
As always, you miss the point. Its not “work harder” Its “Admit you cant do this alone and get help” There have been guest artists before and im betting some of you would LOVE to draw a strip. Also drop the fan boy routine and read the strips critically.. in the beginning they were damn good, a few even brought tears to my eyes (Preston being fooled into admiting hes an “Internet predator”)

I really don’t think I’m the one missing the point here. I’m not defending Bernie (I’m sure he would be the first to admit that the quality of the strips has dropped); I am trying to show you that all of your arguments seem to be based on the entirely fallacious notion that aLp owes you something, as demonstrated by this comment:

lol wrote:
There’s a TINY difference between someone dying and someone claiming month after month that a new strip is “coming soon” there was even a “there’ll be a renewed focus in the new year” post (remember that? You know, two months ago).

When you’ve quite finished judging people, let us know what the view’s like up there on the moral high ground.

And for the record, the idea of bringing guest writers in occasionally has been bandied around on these boards before; I still think it’s a good one.

Anyway, yes, the quality has slipped, and yes, bernie does admit to doing the speeddating strips because they’re quick and easy (like some girls).

However, I have a friend who has a 2 yearold boy, and she can testify as to how tiring and time consuming it is to look after him; now consider that Bernie has 2 2yearolds, a full time job and a wife/family to carefor…. thus endeth the lesson in life.

I do believe guest comics to be a good idea, but if Bernie would rather just feed us itit bits every now and then, so be it- I’d be happy.

As the one who kicked off this LOVELY little debate I feel the need to make some points-
1. Quality slipping? Not the issue. I still think that the strips are funny when and if they’re released. Not as good as before? Possibly. Still good? Yes.
2. The 2 kids, job, marriage issue- Yes, his life has gotten more complicated. How does that justify leading us on for 3 months? (More than 3? 4?)
3. Aurelyn, remember that saying about a pot and a kettle?
4. Do you guys really think that outsourcing the strip to other artists is the answer? Same characters, yeah, but Bernie is why we come here, right?
5. My point, from the beginning is that if Bernie tells us, the fans, the ones for whom he’s making the comics, that he’s going to do something, shouldn’t he do it? And if he feels that he can’t live up to that, shouldn’t he stop? Or do you all enjoy being led on?
6. cfos- you seem to enjoy making statements assuming lots of things about the people you’re responding to with absolutely no information to back these assumptions up. I know that you’re trying to back Bernie up, that’s cool, but how do you know that lol lives with "Mommy and Daddy"?
7. Bernie- if you’ve been reading this, please understand that the reason that people are upset is because the strip is great and it sucks to see it suffer. So rehab it or put it out of it’s misery.

4. Do you guys really think that outsourcing the strip to other artists is the answer? Same characters, yeah, but Bernie is why we come here, right?

I dont know.. i think its worth a go… at worst it wouldent work..

7. Bernie- if you’ve been reading this, please understand that the reason that people are upset is because the strip is great and it sucks to see it suffer. So rehab it or put it out of it’s misery.

Thats what i said!

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I am trying to show you that all of your arguments seem to be based on the entirely fallacious notion that aLp owes you something, as demonstrated by this comment:
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Um, yes he does owe somehthing, he keeps claiming these a new strip coming. You cant keep saying somethings coming but never deliver.

I sponser a kid in … some other country, i cant even remember where off the top of my head, its $20 a week and sometimes its a pain (i have 2 yr old twin girls) but i said id do it so i do. If i ever REALLY could not afford it i would stop. I owe because i said its coming, the day i stop paying is the day i dont owe, and on that day i wont be saying "ill start paying again later" ill stop my donations and that will be that.

jrock wrote:
3. Aurelyn, remember that saying about a pot and a kettle?

Well spotted, but if you actually read my posts, you would have seen my comment at the bottom of the last one regarding my own hypocrisy.

lol wrote:
Um, yes he does owe somehthing, he keeps claiming these a new strip coming. You cant keep saying somethings coming but never deliver.

You haven’t listened to a word anyone’s said, have you? None of us are paying for Bernie’s services, therefore he can claim anything he wants. End. Of. Story.

Obviously it would be great if he took up regular updates as before, but if you feel put upon by his failure to delivere on his "promises", then I suggest you wait for the mailing list to alert you to a new strip.

[size=7:11a5809ca3]Aaaargh! I can’t believe I got sucked into that argument. I’m done. Sorry if I stood on anyone’s toes[/size:11a5809ca3]

Since people are starting to repeat their arguments, I think it’s time to call it a day for now. Because talking in circles isn’t going to make anybody happy.

Quote:
I got an email from my dad which consists solely of a forward of the automatic reminder that Amazon sent him about my birthday. Subject: "Fwd: Bernie’s Birthday Reminder", Message: "Hi. You asked to be reminded today of Bernie’s birthday. etc…" That’s it. That’s AWESOME.

That really sounds like my dad. I don’t hear anything from him in months and then suddenly he calls me to tell me "yes, I remembered I had a son, so I thought I’d call you".
"Dad, you do know you have five sons, right?".
"Indeed. I have a lot of calling to do, so if you don’t mind, I hang up now."

Apparently, he had a similar conversation with all five of us that day…(I have no sisters)

Aurelyn wrote:
Where’s your father geographically in relation to all of you though?

About 100 kilometers to the south of my city, where my brother also lives, 100 kilometers to north of the city where my youngest brother lives and 50 kilometers to the west of where my oldest brother lives. Between him and my other brother, there’s the Atlantic Ocean (my brother lives in NY).

I have never seen him here, though, except for the one time he was on his way home from Sweden, where his sister lives. I thought in revenge I would only visit him on my way to Spain where his brother lives, but I love him too much for that, so I also made a stopover when I was on my way to the airport to catch my plane to Indonesia, where the rest of our family lives.

lol wrote:
I think you will find its pain from seeing a once widely respected online comic becoming a community joke on the scale of "Duke nukum forever"

Absolutely true. It’s a simple credo: don’t tell people you’re going to do something, then not follow through on it, over and over, again. It destroys your credibility, destroys your fans’ faith, and destroys any future chance of relevance.

Bernie owes us nothing, those who don’t understand what’s going on in someone else’s life don’t NEED to understand, it’s not their life.

If you somehow feel some sort of promise was broken, well damn, how exactly has this REALLY hurt you? What actual damage was done to your life?

Please leave the poor guy alone, the more you whine, the more you take the fun out of this comic for Bernie. It’s all about fun, not obligation. The day he feels it’s an obligation is the day IMHO he should quit.

He’ll be back when he is inspired, and life is once again on an even keel. Harassing him sucks the joy out of life, and just adds to the delay.

It continually amazes me that people actually take time out of their obviously very full days to post their complaints about the lack of updates.

Just wondering: is that anything like someone actually taking time out of their obviously very full days to post their complaints about other people posting their complaints? Hmm. Curious.

Curious… indeed. Simply put, the answer to your question is: no. The person complaining about people making complaints isn’t disatisfied with the current status that generatered the complainer’s complaint. In fact, the secondary complainer really doesn’t mind taking time out of their day to visit a site that isn’t updated, thus they wouldn’t mind taking time out of their day to complain about a complainer.

As for your other comment about "promises"… where the heck do you live? Is it a place devoid of politics?

Seriously, though… assuming your "destructionist" view is accurate (which I personally, doubt), why do you keep coming back? You are proving your argument to be worthless for, according to previous posters, nothing has changed, right? Promises of updates that don’t come are met with emo-induced wrist slittingly boring posts about spilt milk… Save your destructionist philosophy for someone who will believe in it — like you. :roll:

I’m looking forward to your reply. Why? It will further disprove your theory as you keep denying the behavior that your theory predicts. :lol:

It continually amazes me that people actually take time out of their obviously very full days to post their complaints about the lack of updates.

Just wondering: is that anything like someone actually taking time out of their obviously very full days to post their complaints about other people posting their complaints? Hmm. Curious.

Well, as cfos so pointed out so well despite the typo you were so good to point out, it’s not at all the same – quite aside from the fact that I don’t mind taking time out of my day to post here, I’m not really complaining per se. You have to admit there’s a difference between an active poster on these boards voicing his disagreement with a comment and someone who just logs in when he feels like giving out about something.